Tax and GDP --- a mismatched growth

'Only 1.0 per cent of the population pay tax', screamed the headline of a news report published in a vernacular daily the other day. This was no revelation. Reports having identical headlines were published in newspapers in the past also....

How Europe can work with Biden

After several anxiety-filled rollercoaster days following the recent US presidential election, it is now all but certain that Joe Biden will become America's next president on January 20, 2021. Whether Democrats also take control of the Senate depends on the...

Shining the digital path for SMEs

Small and medium businesses contribute more to the global economy than what is visible on the surface. They play a vital role everywhere and are estimated by Facebook/OECD/World Bank (2020), The Future of Business survey, to have employed 60 to...

Govt targets Jan 1 trial launch

The government is planning to launch a company-managed city bus service system in a small corridor of the city on a pilot basis.Initially, five companies of 50 owners of buses and minibuses will be merged to operate the service. Sources...

Renewed push for allowing Indian cos in int'l bidding

India has again pressed Bangladesh for allowing its companies to participate in international tenders floated by the government of Bangladesh, officials said."The High Commission of India, Dhaka has further requested the government ministry to look into the matter so that...

BSEC to curb insider trading

The securities regulator has started developing a database of top officials, sponsor-directors and auditors of the listed companies, who are in the know about the price sensitive information (PSI), to fight against 'insider trading'.The information of the officials of the...

Travel tax collections plunge by 89pc in Q1

Travel tax collections slumped by 89.41 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal year because of the coronavirus-induced travel restrictions imposed by most countries around the globe.The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has collected Tk 360 million...

Together again as distancing on the decline

Earlier this year, stringent lockdowns and uncertainty about the severity and transmission of Covid-19 led to the widespread adoption of physical distancing measures across the world. However, as Covid-19 outbreaks began to ebb and lockdowns eased over the summer, measures...

Dead Zone in the Bay of Bengal

A Dead Zone in the Bay of Bengal (BoB), nearly half the size of Bangladesh and at depths 70m and below, has been discovered in recent years by a group of multinational scientists, Bristow et al., (2016). This oxygen-depleted zone,...

Ships wait longer at Ctg port

Shippers using the Chittagong port are getting delayed delivery of containers, as the vessels need to wait nearly five days to get berthing.The congestions at the hub ports in Singapore and Colombo are blamed for the rise in waiting times...

Virus a boon to drug makers

Some leading listed pharmaceuticals companies saw a notable rise in their net profits during the third quarter (July-September) of the current calendar year, thanks to higher expenses of people on healthcare amid the Covid-19 pandemic.Eight listed drug makers disclosed their...

Containing diabetes is a crying need

Diabetes is a group of metabolic diseases, clinically known as Diabetes mellitus, in which a person has high blood sugar, either because the body does not produce enough insulin, or because cells do not respond to the insulin that is...

Vaccine against Covid-19: Research makes a stride

The Covid-19 pandemic caught the world unawares. The speed with which the pandemic virus spread was astounding.The world's health system proved inadequate to meet the challenge thrown by the lethal virus. The seeming helplessness of modern medical science to combat...

APA and efficiency of public servants

Scholars across the world including those in Bangladesh ponder on the way public servants can be made more accountable, and their actions can be made realistic, complementary to development discourse, and pro-people. From long back, the performance target for Deputy...

Covid second wave puts damper on L/C opening

Bangladesh's import orders dropped by nearly 14 per cent in October as apparel exporters scaled back purchase of textiles products, amid the second wave of coronavirus in America and Europe.Opening of letters of credit (LCs), generally known as import orders,...

Of Biden and Pfizer's vaccine

The world witnessed two exciting developments this week---victory of Mr Joe Biden in the highly-charged US electoral battle and 90 per cent effectiveness of coronavirus vaccine researched by the US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and its German partner BioNTECH. Barring millions...

Deterrent to gender violence

Infamous domestic violence is not confined to the four walls in poor and underdeveloped countries. During the first wave of coronavirus pandemic, especial police squads had to be on their toes to respond to SOS calls from the victims of...

America's Presidents . . . and would-be Presidents

So Donald Trump has been beaten at the election by Joe Biden. He refuses to acknowledge the outcome, though. But that really does not matter. He will go or will be made to go. Once that comes to pass, he...

Overlap forces project shelved for now

The government has backtracked on its decision to implement the Tk 20 billion bus-based mass transit line project in the city, pushing another plan to modernise Mohakhali bus terminal into uncertainty, sources said.They said the decision to stop work on...

Govt back at drawing board

Amid slow disbursement of Covid-19 stimulus packages, the government has decided to hold dialogues with trade groups, banks, and the ministries concerned to find a way forward, officials said.The finance division will hold a three-day event at Osmani Memorial Auditorium...

VAT online project awaits yet another extension

The government may extend the much-talked-about VAT Online Project (VOP) by another six months to June 30, 2021, as some of its key components are unlikely to be implemented with the December 31 deadline.The World Bank (WB) has already given...

Young entrepreneurs to come up with business ideas

Patuakhali Science and Technology University (PSTU) for the second time is going to host Hult Prize 2021 on-campus round for young entrepreneurs to stage their business ideas focused on creating a positive impact in the world. Following the assigned challenge...

Battling Child Marriage

UNICEF has released a report in October on the state of child marriage in Bangladesh, which provides a grim picture of this pervasive social malaise in the country despite progress in recent decades. Titled 'Ending Child Marriage: A Profile of...

Empowering garment workers in Bangladesh: The unfinished work of European retailers

Following a series of garment factory fire and building collapses during the last decade that killed hundreds of garment workers and mutilated thousands more, the Western large retailers mostly from Europe formed the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in...

US election: People have emphatically renounced bigotry, divisiveness and xenophobia

The US presidential election process that began about eighteen months ago but gained momentum in the past six months culminated on November 3 handing down a decisive verdict against bigotry, divisiveness and xenophobia. In an unprecedented turn out of about...

Proposal to reduce city's bus routes to 42

A proposal to reduce city's bus routes from 291 to 42 and divide its area into nine clusters for operating public transports under the company system has been submitted to the bus route rationalization committee. It has also been proposed...

Bridging the digital divide to scale up the Covid-19 recovery

Digitalisation has in the past few years enabled developing countries in particular to leapfrog on financial inclusion. Countries like Kenya, Ghana, Rwanda and Tanzania have made great advances in connecting their citizens to financial systems by leveraging on mobile phone...

In quest of a gutsy central bank

Regulatory regime of financial sector of any country is important for effective and smooth functioning of all financial institutions. In the wake of global as well as domestic financial challenges an independent and strong central bank is essential. Central bank...

BSEC gets lukewarm response from companies

Companies willing to raise funds showed lukewarm response to submit IPO proposals based on the financials for the year ended on June 30 as COVID-19 hit their businesses along with hampering preparation of going public.Most of the local companies submitted...

Rupali Bank in disarray for cash crunch

The state-run Rupali Bank Ltd is finding it hard to run normal business operations due to its continuing capital shortfall, officials said.The latest available figures show the volume of capital shortfall of the trouble-torn bank rose to Tk 8.47 billion...